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OTTAWA — A collection of more than 700 stakeholders from the business world, non-government groups, the academic sector and faith-based leaders are calling on provincial and territorial premiers to adopt a new clean-energy accord as a pathway to new jobs and trillions of dollars in ongoing and anticipated global investments in an emerging market.

Andrew Heintzman, president and chief executive officer of Investeco, an environmental investment firm, said the supporters in the plan want governments to "look beyond fossil fuels" such as oil, gas and coal. Instead, he said they should consider larger opportunities to build smart electricity grids, promote energy efficiency and clean up Canada's energy sector through specific government policies.

He explained Alberta's oilsands industry, which launched its first commercial operations in the middle of the 20th century, only became a "beacon of private-sector investment," after getting financial support from governments.

"As we all know, it (the oilsands sector) was a very long product of significant government investment over many years that brought it to where it is today," said Heintzman, who heads a firm that manages about $45 million in assets for about 120 investors. "I think that energy policy is usually fairly tied up with government policy. It's just the nature of it."

The stakeholders were brought together by Tides Canada, a charitable foundation that has been fending off direct and indirect attacks from the Harper government and Alberta-based energy company, Enbridge. They have suggested Tides Canada is involved in a conspiracy to shutdown the oilsands sector through campaigns funded by American billionnaires.

But the foundation is urging premiers gathered for the upcoming Council of the Federation meeting to endorse their strategy so Canada can take advantage of an anticipated $3 trillion dollars worth of anticipated investments around the world in clean energy technologies and jobs over the next decade.

In a recent report released last spring - entitled "Towards a Clean Energy Accord" - Tides Canada noted the country contributes to about two per cent of the global economy, but only accounts for about one per cent of the global clean technology market.

"Indeed, we will not likely make the needed changes to compete as a nation unless each government sees itself as part of a larger effort to do so," said the report. "We can and must capture a greater share of the jobs and opportunities presented by the energy transition. We can also follow through on our international commitments to reduce our carbon emissions."

The Tides Canada recommendations have also been accepted by unions such as the Alberta Federation of Labour, industry lobby groups such as the Canadian Wind Energy Association, environmental groups such as the David Suzuki Foundation as well as academics such as climate change scientist Andrew Weaver.

Alberta Premier Alison Redford has also asked other premiers and the federal government to support her own calls for a national energy strategy that would pull together different regional economic sectors with complimentary policies.

She has suggested Canada could then lead the world on issues such as energy supply, innovation and efficiency as well as climate change through such a strategy that would also support growth in the oilsands.

The Tides Canada report also noted the International Energy Agency, a partnership of governments from around the world that offers advice on energy policy, suggested last April that dramatic changes were needed to prevent consumption of fossil fuels and the resulting greenhouse gas emissions from driving global temperatures more than six degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and causing irreversible changes to the Earth's climate and ecosystems.

The Province, Tues July 17 2012
Byline: Mike De Souza

Hands down one of the most interesting events at the Council of the Federation meetings in Halifax, Nova Scotia to date was a joint presentation by Merran Smith from Clean Energy Canada at Tides Canada, Steven Guilbeault from Équiterre, and Gil McGowan at the Alberta Federation of Labour on what Canadians want from a national energy strategy. The springboard was a poll conducted on behalf of Tides Canada by Harris-Decima (1005 Canadians polled between July 5-9, 2012; results valid at +/- 3.1 per cent).

The results are striking. It's clear that a vast majority of Canadians want Canada to reduce its reliance on fossil fuels (66 per cent), to create more clean energy jobs (74 per cent), to reduce carbon emissions to slow down climate change (67 per cent), and to improve its energy efficiency (82 per cent). A minority (33 per cent) wants Canada to focus on exporting more oil and gas.

Harris-Decima poll results

On two further key issues, 83 per cent of Canadian feel that Canada should set aside a portion of its oil wealth to help prepare the country for a clean and renewable energy future, and 87 per cent agree that Canada needs an energy strategy to plan our nation's energy future.

Harris-Decima poll results

It's hard not to be struck by the stark contrast between these results, reflecting the desires of Canadian citizens on the one hand, and the single-minded focus of the Harper Government on fossil fuels (and in particular, on rapidly accelerating the exploitation of the bitumen sands), its relentless determination to foster pipeline construction to ship bitumen to foreign markets rather than developing refining and other value-added capacity in Canada, the lack of a national Canadian energy strategy, Canada's formal withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol and the substitution of utterly inadequate, bogus, and unrealized emission targets for carbon dioxide reductions, and its seeming indifference to the potential of capitalizing on the immense economic opportunities of alternative energy technologies.

Furthermore, since the province of Alberta ceased making contributions to the Heritage Savings Trust Fund in 1987 (and even before 1987, it was only 30 per cent of oil revenue royalties rather than the 100 per cent that the Government of Norway contributes to the Pension Fund of Norway), neither Alberta nor the Canadian government have invested oil revenues "to help prepare the country for a clean and renewable energy future". Indeed, given the wholly inadequate royalty structure in Alberta, which charges the lowest rates of almost any government in the world (39 per cent compared to the 76 per cent that the government of Norway charges Big Oil on its revenues from North Sea oil) colossal sums of money have flowed out of Canada and into the coffers of foreign multinational oil interests rather than being invested in any, environmental, or economic initiatives here.

Given the complete disconnect between what this Harris-Decima poll indicates the priorities of Canadians are, and the policies of the Harper Government, one might almost be lead to believe that the Harper Conservatives are governing on behalf of some entirely different nation -- Saudi Arabia, perhaps.

At the press conference to release the results of the polling, Merran Smith from Tides Canada discussed the data. Then Steven Guilbeault from Équiterre brought an environmental perspective to their implications, the development of an energy policy in Canada in 2012 being intimately connected on almost every level with environmental and climate change issues. With some 3,215 high-temperature records broken in the month of June in the United States, widespread droughts, flooding, mudslides, tornados, wildfires, and other extreme weather events, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reporting that there have now been 328 consecutive months of above average temperatures in the world, an all time record decline of arctic sea ice, an unprecedented increase in the melting of ice on the Greenland ice cap and an increase in its albedo -- and all of these precisely consistent with the weather patterns we would expect to see associated with climate change -- it's becoming increasingly difficult to come to any reasonable conclusion other than the fact that we are witnessing the effects of climate change -- and at a pace that virtually no one expected or predicted even five years ago when the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issues its most recent series of climate change reports.

Rounding out the presentation was an excellent discussion by Gil McGowan of the Alberta Federation of Labour on the human, labour, employment, and economic dimensions related to energy, the need for a comprehensive energy strategy, and the enormous costs and lost opportunities of Canada's not having one. Without uttering the words "Dutch Disease" McGowan gave an excellent encapsulation of this phenomenon and what it has done to manufacturing and other sectors of the economy reliant on exports, and what the employment costs of this have been -- a topic I discussed at some length in my article, Dutch disease denial: Inflation, politics, and tar.

This is particularly pointed issue at the Council of the Federation meetings in Halifax given both the injection of this issue into the national political landscape by Alberta Premier Alison Redford, and the current very sharp dispute (painfully on display at the meetings) between Redford and British Columbia Premier Christy Clark, in relation to the proposed economic and environmental terms between the two provinces on the Northern Gateway Pipeline proposal. Clark argues that British Columbia will be exposed to the lion's share of environmental risks of such a pipeline proposal, both along the land corridor of the pipeline, and in the sea lanes that lead to the proposed oil terminal in Kitimat, BC. Consequently, she wants a greater share of the oil royalties for BC and threatens to otherwise block permission for the pipeline to pass through British Columbia. Redford refuses to negotiate and refuses to budge.

Smith, Guilbeault, and McGowan all made it clear that they expect -- and Canadians demand -- much more from a Canadian energy strategy then a mutual non-aggression pact between provinces. As the answers to the polls indicate, there are many other energy issues on the table: alternative east-west pipeline and electricity transmission corridors, the development of a smart grid, the issue of oil royalties, of heritage fund contributions, vaccines against Dutch Disease, energy security, national energy sustainability, measures to address climate change, the robust development of renewable energy resources, a transition to an sustainable energy economy, feed-in tariffs for a wide variety of green energy sources, and a multitude of other important issues that must be addressed if Canada is to have a sustainable future. Indeed, given the imperatives of climate change, a failure to develop a Canadian energy strategy to address all these critical issues, could be a fatal mistake -- politically, economically, and environmentally.

An important step in this direction are a series of proposals entitled Towards a Clean Energy Accord developed by Clean Energy Canada. It presents a convincing case for the importance of developing a Canadian energy strategy. Let's hope the Canadian premiers gathered at the Council of the Federation meetings are listening.

Christopher Majka is a biologist, environmentalist, policy analyst, and arts advocate. He conducts research on the ecology and biodiversity of beetles. He is a research associate of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and a member of the Project Democracy team.

Rabble.ca, Tues July 17 2012
Byline: Christopher Majka

An Alberta labour group is slamming an agreement making it easier for Alberta companies to hire skilled foreign tradespeople.

Federal Immigration Minister Jason Kenney is easing foreign-worker restrictions. Federal Immigration Minister Jason Kenney is easing foreign-worker restrictions. (CBC)

"Under this program, employers don't have to show that they've made any attempts to fill these jobs with Canadians first," said Nancy Furlong, with the Alberta Federation of Labour.

"Kenney's latest move makes the Temporary Foreign Workers program an employer's first choice, not last resort," she said.

Federal Immigration Minister Jason Kenney announced Monday a one-year pilot project that will reduce the paperwork needed to hire skilled workers under the Temporary Foreign Workers Program.

Instead of waiting months to get to work, it will now take only 30 minutes, said Kenney.

"They can immediately begin recruiting in visa exempt countries like the US, invite those folks to come up and as long as they make an application for their certification to get their ticket to work as a trades person they'll get a work permit at the airport," he said.

The province is short welders, heavy-duty mechanics, ironworkers, millwrights, carpenter and estimators.

But the AFL said the project will leave even fewer safeguards against abuses such as poor working conditions and unscrupulous recruiters charging illegal fees.

"Foreign workers are supposed to receive comparable wages and working conditions as Canadians, but there are no real mechanisms in place to ensure this happens," said Furlong. "Once the foreign workers are in the province, they work at the whim of their employer."

The AFL believes the Temporary Foreign Workers Program should be scrapped in favour of an immigration policy that brings in new Canadians to address labour shortages.

"This is not about a labour shortage, it's a low-wage strategy," said Furlong. "This is mostly designed to give companies access to a big pool of non-union construction labour that is desperate for work."

Kenney said he will protect Canadian workers by ending the pilot project early if the job market changes and unemployment rises.

CBC News Calgary, Tues July 17 2012

Easing restrictions makes foreign workers employers' first choice not last resort, says AFL

An Alberta labour group is slamming an agreement making it easier for Alberta companies to hire skilled foreign tradespeople.

Federal Immigration Minister Jason Kenney is easing foreign-worker restrictions.Federal Immigration Minister Jason Kenney is easing foreign-worker restrictions. (CBC)

"Under this program, employers don't have to show that they've made any attempts to fill these jobs with Canadians first," said Nancy Furlong, with the Alberta Federation of Labour.

"Kenney's latest move makes the Temporary Foreign Workers program an employer's first choice, not last resort," she said.

Federal Immigration Minister Jason Kenney announced Monday a one-year pilot project that will reduce the paperwork needed to hire skilled workers under the Temporary Foreign Workers Program.

Instead of waiting months to get to work, it will now take only 30 minutes, said Kenney

"They can immediately begin recruiting in visa exempt countries like the US, invite those folks to come up and as long as they make an application for their certification to get their ticket to work as a trades person they'll get a work permit at the airport," he said.

The province is short welders, heavy-duty mechanics, ironworkers, millwrights, carpenter and estimators.

But the AFL said the project will leave even fewer safeguards against abuses such as poor working conditions and unscrupulous recruiters charging illegal fees.

"Foreign workers are supposed to receive comparable wages and working conditions as Canadians, but there are no real mechanisms in place to ensure this happens," said Furlong. "Once the foreign workers are in the province, they work at the whim of their employer."

The AFL believes the Temporary Foreign Workers Program should be scrapped in favour of an immigration policy that brings in new Canadians to address labour shortages.

"This is not about a labour shortage, it's a low-wage strategy," said Furlong. "This is mostly designed to give companies access to a big pool of non-union construction labour that is desperate for work."

Kenney said he will protect Canadian workers by ending the pilot project early if the job market changes and unemployment rises.

CBC News, July 17 2012

EDMONTON - The door is open much wider for temporary foreign workers in six construction jobs, and tradesmen from the U.S. can now pick up work permits at the airport, the federal immigration minister announced Monday.

But organized labour is worried Canadians may be left out if companies are no longer required to consider them first in six job categories.

At Alberta's request, the federal government has agreed to eliminate the requirement that an employer must prove that Canadians were not available (called a labour market opinion) in six job categories — welder, ironworker, carpenter, estimator, millwright and heavy duty equipment mechanic. Pipefitters have been coming for a year without a requirement for the LMO.

These are high-demand occupations and employers need to be able to recruit workers much faster to meet growing demand in the oilsands and in Edmonton, where the unemployment rate is 4.4 per cent, Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said.

Once inside the province, temporary workers will now be able to take jobs with other employers when their first contracts are over, Kenney said. Previously, foreign workers could not change employers.

Kenney said he had no concerns about eliminating the requirement for the LMO, a document outlining evidence of a shortage in a particular category of worker and proof the employer had advertised in Canada for workers but got no response.

Kenney stressed he would rely on the provincial government to keep an eye on trends in construction employment to determine if the shortage turns into an oversupply of labour in those categories.

Kenney said he doesn't think the federal government will be "so keen" to open the doors that wide in other areas, including for unskilled temporary foreign workers.

Temporary foreign workers must have job offers and documents to prove they are qualified in a trade before getting work permits.

The new rules will help companies recruit in the U.S., where many construction workers remain unemployed, Kenney said. U.S. workers can work for three weeks and spend a week back home — a pattern common for many Canadians working in the oilsands.

But Gil McGowan, head of the Alberta Federation of Labour, said it's a mistake to eliminate the LMO, the one check in the system that protected Canadian access to such jobs.

"We're troubled by this decision, which eliminates the checks and balance," said McGowan.

Alberta's non-union contractors gain a big advantage under the new system, he said. Along with elimination of the LMO, Prime Minister Stephen Harper three months ago announced foreign workers can be paid up to 15 per cent less than the going Canadian wage.

But union employers must abide by the collective agreement, said McGowan.

"This will help make foreign workers the first choice not the last resort," said McGowan.

"This is not about a labour shortage, it's a low wage strategy. This is mostly designed to give companies access to a big pool of construction labour in the U.S. that is desperate for jobs."

McGowan noted that half the companies looking for construction workers do not have apprenticeship training programs, and said those companies should not be allowed to bring in temporary workers.

"They don't want long-term solutions, they want quick fixes, and that's what Harper will give them."

Some parts of Canada have not recovered from the 2008 recession and unemployment remains high in parts of Eastern Canada, he said. "The federal government should be ashamed of itself given the high unemployment in some provinces."

Stephen Khan, Alberta's minister for enterprise and advanced education, said he's pleased with the new rules, which will create a fast track for six occupations by eliminating paperwork and weeks of waiting involved to obtain the LMO.

"We are engaging industry" to take a bigger role in recruiting labour, he said. "They can identify what they need and who they want."

Khan said he's not concerned there is no check in the system to make sure Canadians get first shot at the jobs. The government will be guided by "internal metrics" about the job market, he said.

"We have to make sure we stay ahead of the curve," said Khan.

In a meeting Monday with the Journal editorial board, Kenney noted there is high unemployment among aboriginal youth and up to 14 per cent of immigrants are jobless or chronically underemployed.

"I think employers have to do a lot more about skill training," he said.

Kenney said he is not considering extending permanent residency to temporary foreign workers, since that would add another 180,000 people to the 280,000 annually allowed into the country.

"If we were to grant residency to all, that would be 400,000 and I don't think that is sustainable."

The Edmonton Journal, July 16 2012
Byline: Sheila Pratt

Campers at Florida's Tampa Liberty School travel in cardboard boats across the partitioned classroom, leaving the tyranny of the Old World for the liberty of the New World, where they toss confetti in celebration of the American Revolution. Then boys like nine-year-old Jett Yarborough and his two older brothers sweep up the red-white-and-blue mess as a lesson that freedom carries responsibility.

At the annual Alberta Federation of Labour summer camp, activists' children catch the "Union Express" bus bound for the Rocky Mountain camp, where they are taught the history and merits of unions by "volunteer Sisters and Brothers from the labour movement," boasts a flyer for this year's August camp. And at the first national CUPE Youth Council last year, kids like nine-year-old Allyson Harding put "Get Rid of Harper" on a Sharpee-scribbled list of "What we want to change," and visited Occupy Vancouver, where a protester told the children: "It's not fair that just a few people have everything."

"To some extent this is how you indoctrinate youth — you get them involved in fun activities and you teach them a message on the side," said Troy Glover, a University of Waterloo associate professor and the lead researcher on the Canadian Summer Camp Research Project.

When most Canadians think of camp, they think of hot summer days spent canoeing, orienteering and roasting marshmallows. The Alberta camp, for example, offers all of those things, but it, like a growing number of other camps these days, has something else, too: A clear ideological bias.

Mothers and fathers in Kentucky and Ohio can register their children for Tea Party-inspired programs, and unionized parents can send their kids to labour-federation camps in Saskatchewan and New Brunswick, where Allyson's older sister, Rebecca, once listened to a speaker from the Equal Pay Coalition.

There are environmentalist programs such as Camp Eco in Colorado, EcoCamp in Georgia or Ontario's Glen Bernard Camp, where kids "live lightly," use composting toilets and learn "earth education" in a three-storey solar-powered building called Kosmos. There is San Antonio's Summer Camp Humane for children as young as five, where kids learn about the "humane treatment of animals" and help with "service projects to benefit our shelter animals."

And parents who send their eight- to 13-year-old children to master veganism at the Catskill Animal Sanctuary's Camp Kindness in New York, be advised: "The Camp Kindness program includes age-appropriate discussions and activities covering factory farming and animal welfare issues ... [The sanctuary] advocates for a vegan diet as the only diet that is kind and sustainable," the website says.

"Parents want their children to hang out with kids whose parents think like them — it's a natural gravitation," said Frank Furedi, a sociologist at the University of Kent in Britain. "If you take your values seriously, you'll want to influence your child. This is just an extreme version of that."

Parents who enjoy hockey or the ballet take their children to NHL games or the Nutcracker. Catholic mothers and fathers take their children to church, Jews to synagogue, Muslims to the mosque. Is sending a child to an ideological camp simply an extension of that sort of natural parental influence, or is it inappropriate?

Experts are divided on whether such camps are appropriate for children too young to safely sit in the front seat of a vehicle. Mr. Furedi said not only is there "something weird" about these camps, but they could deepen the societal divisions that already exist. And Mr. Glover said he is simply "uncomfortable" at the idea of camps where children could be ostracized for going against the ideological grain.

"Camp can be very powerful," he said. "In any group environment, it's easy to fall into group think.... Whether we're talking about the Tea Party perspective or the Occupy perspective, it would be very difficult for a young child to be part of that program and espouse different views."

But Kathy Lynn, a leading Canadian speaker and blogger on parenting, said ideological camps can help connect children with their parents by teaching them what is important to their mothers and fathers. There are only consequences, she said, when parents force their children to attend a camp they clearly do not want to attend.

"Sometimes you take a risk — we introduce kids to things they don't like all the time," she said. "But you really just have to pay attention [to how the child reacts]."

Camps that openly teach a particular belief system are not new to North America — there have long been Bible camps, socialist-Zionist camps modelled off the Israeli kibbutz, and even some of Canada's union camps are decades-old. The past year or so, though, has seen the proliferation of new ones, such as the national CUPE program, which ran for the first time last November alongside the union's convention in Vancouver, and the Tampa liberty school.

"[The liberty schools] teach the truth; they teach our founding documents, faith, hope and charity," said Dinah Yarborough, whose three sons, Jett, Blaze and Cotton, attended the Tampa camp last summer and are among the 40 or so children signed up to go again next month. "My eight-year-old son came home thrilled that it wasn't just mom and dad and all the grown-ups who have rights, but that kids have rights, too."

While the libertarian Tampa camp claims to be apolitical — "We don't talk about anybody who is alive today, just people like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson," founder Jeff Lukens said — the CUPE program for children aged nine to 14 appears to make its politics obvious.

Kids like Allyson joined the 3,000 union delegates in watching a video tribute to Jack Layton. And at a CUPE Ontario convention a few years ago, children re-enacted a scene where one boy, Noah, plays a worker who is told he will retire with zero benefits. Soon Noah realizes he cannot pay for his medication at the pharmacy and finds himself poor in a homeless shelter. Thankfully for him, it is all just a bad dream because the union had his back: "The union has negotiated that you will get benefits when you retire," declares the union president, played by a child named Tristan.

The kids celebrated by dancing the Macarena.

"Children are over-exposed to partisan political views in the media all the time," said Sandy Harding, Allyson's mother and CUPE's regional vice-president for New Brunswick. "I think the [union program] actually provided a balanced approach.... It's about showing children the reality of what things are like in Canada, what it's like for workers — the struggle."

If you take your values seriously, you'll want to influence your child. This is just an extreme version of that When asked whether the program was political or ideological, Susan Ruffo, the director of union development, said: "It's educational." When offered the above examples, she said, "It's political education."

Ms. Ruffo said there were "no concerns" about taking children as young as nine to visit Occupy Vancouver, where the kids saw a poster that said "Stop the war on the poor/Make the rich pay" and where several protesters were later arrested, because most children had already been to rallies with their parents.

Only unionists' children can attend the Alberta summer camp, said Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Labour Federation, adding that the group "makes no apologies for trying to bring information of this nature to the children of union members and activists."

Mr. Glover, the University of Waterloo professor, said he would not send his two young children to an ideological camp — whether left or right.

"Should other people avoid doing so? I think that comes down to the parent's perspective," he said. "How strongly do they feel the need to indoctrinate their children?"

National Post, Friday June 29, 2012

Byline: Kathryn Blaze Carlson

Federal government to review deal

The proposed takeover of Calgary petroleum producer Nexen Inc. by a Chinese state-owned oil company sparked a fiery debate Monday, with the Alberta government welcoming foreign investment as opposition parties, unions and some business leaders urged caution.

Federal Industry Minister Christian Paradis announced Monday that Ottawa will review the China National Offshore Oil Corp.'s (CNOOC) $15-billion bid for Nexen under the Investment Canada Act.

The federal minister will have the final say on whether the takeover goes through, based on if it's deemed a net benefit to Canada.

Although the provincial government has no formal say in the matter, Energy Minister Ken Hughes said the news is further evidence of the importance of Alberta's oilsands in meeting global energy demand.

"Foreign investment benefits Albertans, and Canadians, putting Canadian firms in a better position to compete globally," Hughes said.

"The investment required to develop oilsands resources is significant . . . The result is jobs for Canadians here and abroad, and competitive products on an international market."

The Nexen takeover is not the first Chinese state-owned enterprise foray into Canada, but it's by far the biggest. The $15.1-billion agreement is equal to the amount Chinese firms have invested in Canada's oil and gas industry over the last three years.

The sheer size of the takeover will put Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the premiers to the test, forcing them to decide how to handle the future of the oilpatch, said University of Calgary economist Jack Mintz.

"It's going to be fascinating," Mintz said in an interview.

Debate over the Nexen deal began immediately after the news was announced Monday. Federal NDP energy critic Peter Julian said the Harper government needs to better define the criteria for a foreign sale, and the Nexen takeover should be subject to a transparent review - not decided behind closed doors.

Liberal industry critic Geoff Regan said in assessing the "blockbuster" deal, the Harper government needs to determine whether Canadian companies will be given reciprocal leeway to make major investments in China - and whether the state-owned company will act according to free market principles.

In Alberta, Liberal MLA Kent Hehr said the proposed sale should provoke questions about whether Albertans are losing control of their own resources.

And Alberta Federation of Labour president Gil McGowan said Canadians shouldn't let a company like Calgary-based Nexen, with a major stake in the oilsands, fall into the control of a foreign government without serious reflection.

"They'll keep the best jobs for themselves. They'll do the minimum to protect the environment and ignore Canada's long-term energy needs in favour of their own nation's needs," McGowan said.

But Gordon Houlden, director of the University of Alberta's China Institute, said given the size of the Chinese economy, it would be strange if the Asian powerhouse wasn't investing in Canadian energy companies.

He noted China is still a smaller player than Europe and the U.S. in Canada's oilpatch, but the U.S. will quickly realize it has a robust competitor north of the border.

The Nexen deal is likely to draw comparisons with CNOOC's $18.5-billion bid for U.S. energy giant Unocal in 2005, a tender ultimately beaten down by political opposition on Capitol Hill.

In Canada, the Harper government blocked Australian miner BHP Billiton Ltd.'s hostile bid in 2010 for Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan after political and business leaders lobbied against it.

Dick Haskayne, one of those business leaders, said the onus is on Nexen and CNOOC to prove this latest deal is a net benefit to Canada.

Haskayne, one of Calgary's most prominent energy executives, said Ottawa's decision needs to be shaped by the fact a number of energy companies hammered by the global economic slowdown and low natural gas prices are also ripe for a takeover.

"It's going to be a critical decision," Haskayne said. "It's not just Nexen. If Nexen is approved, you know the other ones that are in the same league."

Haskayne said he doesn't know all the pros and cons of the deal, but one of his key concerns is whether a pledge to keep a head office in Calgary is met.

But businessman Jim Gray, who also opposed the Potash Corp. sale, said it's a good thing Canada is building a closer relationship with the country poised to become the world's largest economy.

The chairman of the energy group of Brookfield Asset Management said he was concerned about Potash Corp. falling into the hands of a foreign entity because the Saskatchewan company controls one-fifth of the global resource.

Control of the oilsands isn't as concentrated, Gray noted. While Nexen is a major Canadian company, much of its assets are located outside the country.

"There's no parallel between those two deals," he said.

Recent Chinese investments in Alberta

- July 23: Calgary-based Nexen Inc. agrees to a friendly $15-billion takeover bid by CNOOC, China's largest offshore oil producer. Separately, Talisman Energy agrees to sell a 49-per-cent interest in its UK division to Sinopec Corp. for $1.5 billion.

- January: Calgary-based Athabasca Oil Sands Corp. announces it is selling its remaining 40 per cent of the MacKay River project in northern Alberta to PetroChina for $680 million. PetroChina becomes the first Chinese-state-owned company to wholly own a Canadian oilsands project.

- December 2011: Sinopec Group spends $2.2 billion acquiring Calgary oil and gas explorer Daylight Energy Ltd.

- November 2011: CNOOC buys Calgary oilsands developer Opti Canada Inc. for $2.1 billion US.

- May 2010: China Investment Corp. injects $1.25 billion into Penn West Energy to develop the trust's oilsands assets in the Peace River region.

- April 2010: Sinopec purchases ConocoPhillips' nine per cent stake in Syncrude for $4.65 billion.

- August 2009: PetroChina buys a 60-per-cent share in Athabasca Oil Sands' MacKay River and Dover projects for $1.9 billion.

- April 2005: CNOOC Ltd. pays $122 million for 16.7 per cent in MEG Energy Ltd. for a northern Alberta oilsands project.

The Edmonton Journal, July 24 2012
Byline: Kelly Cryderman, Calgary Herald
With files from The Canadian Press

Testing ineffective and invades privacy, says labour federation boss

Alberta labour advocates say random drug testing in the oilpatch isn't the answer to making workers safer.

Criticism of the tests followed the announcement Wednesday that three major oil companies will begin random drug screening of workers as part of an industry pilot project this fall.

Oil giants Suncor Energy, Total E&P Canada and Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. have all signed onto the Drug and Alcohol Risk Reduction Pilot Project, set to begin this fall.

While most oil companies already use some form of screening, DARRPP hopes to prove that random testing will significantly deter substance abuse in the workplace.

But according to some labour experts, random tests are not necessarily the best method for determining impairment.

"Drug tests, particularly pee tests, typically test for the presence of residue of previous or prior substance use, but that doesn't necessarily mean you are presently impaired," said the Athabasca University professor.

"And if it is not an effective way to determine present impairment, then what purpose does it serve other than to invade the privacy of employees?"

Alberta Federation of Labour boss Gil McGowan said he worries the measures are too heavy-handed.

"It's rare for workers to be under the influence of intoxicants in the workplace," said McGowan.

"This kind of testing is a gross overreaction. By their very nature, random tests are designed to sweep thousands of innocent workers into the net in the hopes of finding one or two under the influence."

But one of the top occupational drug testing services in the country says the new measures aren't all that drastic.

"This is certainly not anything new and drug and alcohol testing is very frequently done before anybody can get on site," said Peter Deines of Cannamm Occupational Testing Services.

Workers are tested routinely before accessing the site, whenever an employer has reasonable cause to be suspicious of substance abuse, and after any incidents, says Deines.

He said testing is not meant to be a 'witch hunt' and that all tests allow for a small amount of drugs in an individual's system to account for passive, or "indirect" exposure, such as second hand marijuana smoke.

"It's not a witch hunt. It's to determine the safety risk," he said.

News of the pilot project spread quickly in Alberta's bitumen capital.

A Fort McMurray DJ who posted a fake ad online offering tricks to cheat on drug tests said he's 'shocked' by the number of response the ad received.

Chris Byrne said the ad was viewed more than 50 times and that he received a dozen e-mail responses in under a day.

"I just wanted to see what the reaction would be," said the Rock 97.9 radio announcer. "I was shocked over the number of people who sent me an e-mail."

Byrne said responses to the ad ranged from curiosity over what was being offered to the logistics of how to obtain a "clean" urine sample.

But he added that most McMurrayites seem comfortable with the idea of random testing.

"People on site know that any incident that happens, they have to go for a drug test," said Byrne.

"I was kind of surprised at the number of people that weren't taking offence to the drug testing but were saying 'yeah this should be done'," said Byrne. "It was more like, 'let's try to make it safer'."

Calgary Herald, Fri Jun 22 2012
Byline: Meghan Potkins

Strength is found in community as the AFL reflects on 100 years of organizing

This month the Alberta Federation of Labour is celebrating its 100th anniversary. Celebratory activities to date have included the publication of a book, unveiling of monuments and plaques, displays in galleries, museums and libraries around the province, a concert tour by Maria Dunn, a labour history conference, a homecoming dinner for current and former staff and elected members, and many more.

But the event that most stands out for me is the full day celebration that took place at Fort Edmonton Park last Saturday. The celebration included music, videos, speeches, retrospectives, games for the kids, a tea for seniors, a beer garden and a terrific meal.

None of those is what made the event stand out, however. What did were the people and the energy they shared. Front-line union members, executives, and staff were expected, but the presence of activists from around the province, community leaders, city councillors, MLAs, artists and musicians, reps from various non-profit organizations, and people from across generations made it more than just another labour event. It was a community coming together and a celebration in the truest sense of the word, and it was fun. Perhaps none of that should have come as a surprise, but it did.

Across Alberta and Canada unions are under attack by governments determined to undo progress made over the last 100 years, and reverse the benefits that workers have fought for and won not just for themselves, but for our entire society.

At the same time, non-profits, community organizations, seniors, environmental organizations and advocacy groups are also under attack. Programming is being de-funded, activists of all types are being demonized and dissent is being squashed.

To hear conservative politicians and the mainstream media tell it, unions are obsolete and irrelevant, but the atmosphere and attitudes of people attending Saturday's events revealed a different perception.

Bringing together all of these groups as a community for a genuine day of celebration in the midst of these challenging times is no small feat. It was impressive, and the AFL is to be commended for the accomplishment. Beyond being impressive, however, Saturday's event was important.

It was important because it highlighted the power of community and celebration to folks engaged in the difficult task of bringing progressive change to our province and country. It's too easy to focus on the challenges and the losses, and get caught up in the immediate imperative of our particular issues and our particular organizations.

Coming together to celebrate reminds that we are not alone in our struggles and that we have achieved great things. Coming together as a broad community, with our children, elders and friends, reminds us of why we are engaged in the struggle in the first place and gives us the strength and motivation to keep going.

It was also important because it showed the way forward. The challenges we face today are significant, and in many ways too large and daunting for any one individual or organization to take on alone. Events like Saturday's remind us that we are not alone—that there are many others around us who share a big picture vision of the society we want. The challenge is for all of us to move beyond our egos and our singular focus on our particular issues and organizations, and to strategize together on how we make progress on the goals that unite us.

The Alberta Federation of Labour was born when Alberta's farmers, urban workers and rural workers came to the realization that in many ways their struggles were one and the same. One hundred years later we need to come to the realization that the struggles of environmentalists, seniors, first nations, the poor and community activists also have much in common with the struggles of unions and workers. Let's honour the example of those AFL pioneers, and the lessons of last Saturday, and begin moving forward together in ways that will ensure that in a 100 years those who come next will also have something to celebrate. V

Ricardo Acuña is the executive director of the Parkland Institute, a non-partisan, public policy research institute housed at the University of Alberta.

Vue Weekly, June 20, 2012

The Alberta Federation of Labour celebrated a milestone Saturday.

The AFL is marking its 100th birthday by throwing a party at Fort Edmonton Park.

A small group of railway workers and trades people formed what was to become the modern-day AFL back in June of 1912.

President Gil McGowan says the group, which is made up of unions from both public and private sectors across the province, has been a pivotal support for Alberta's middle class.

"When we first got together those long years ago there was no minimum wage, there was no occupational health and safety rules. It was a hard time, wages were low, jobs were insecure and that was the big goal of the federation at that time, to bring some respect and dignity to the working people," McGowan said.

"Looking back over the hundred years we can say that our movement has been tremendously successful in bringing dignity and respect to working people."

The AFL said today's celebration was also a time to recommit to the labour movement.

McGowan said rights that have been won must be maintained and expanded.

"Many gains we've won can easily be lost," he said.

"We feel that there is a threat because we have governments that want to bring American-style anti-union labour laws north of the border. We have to commit ourselves to stop that from happening."

Many Edmontonians came out to celebrate 100 years of union victories in the province.

There was a parade, family-friendly activities and live musical performances.

The AFL represents more than 150,000 workers.

Centennial festivities run until 11:30 p.m. Saturday.

ctv.ca, Sat Jun 16 2012